Much nonsense has been written about this, while Gay Patriot has come across a man, Doug Feith (former Bush Undersecretary of Defense), who clears up some of the fog in War and Decision: Inside the Pentagon at the Dawn of the War on Terrorism:
He (Feith) observes that his book “tells a story that contradicts key parts of almost all the major books about the Iraq war,” refuting, for example, “the notion that President Bush came into office determined to go to war no matter what.” Discussing how the president’s team made the call to go to war, he quoted from his book:
Our main concern was not that Saddam would then attack the United States out of the blue. We worried rather that, in his effort to dominate the Persian Gulf and the broader Middle East, Saddam would aim to deter outside intervention by developing his conventional and WMD capabilities, along with the prohibited long-range missiles (or, possibly, terrorist alliances) to deliver them.
In some future clash— over Kuwait or some other Iraqi target— Saddam might draw inspiration from 9/11, providing terrorists with anthrax, smallpox, or nerve gas to attack us.
What impressed me about Feith was his civility, his command of the issues and his good humor. I consider myself fortunate that I had the chance to talk with him, albeit briefly, about his experiences in the Administration and in dealing with a hostile press, interested in him not so much to learn his contribution to policy-making, but instead to ridicule him as a caricature of a gung-ho pro-war conservative.
Doug Feith was far from the caricature of the out-of-touch Republican official. Instead her offered a lucid explanation of the decision to go to war that makes one wonder why the Administration didn’t put him at the forefront of their efforts to explain its policies to the American people. The president would have been better served had it relied more on Feith’s counsel in setting policy in Iraq and his verbal gifts in communicating that policy to the American people.
That, by the way, was not my primary concern – from my point of view, the whole purpose of liberating Iraq was to change the socio-political dynamic of the Arab/Moslem world and reorientate it in a pluralistic, democratic direction. The liberation was a means to an end – namely, that the people of the Arab/Moslem world be given a fair chance at deciding their own future, with a prayer on our part that they will choose to live and build rather than kill and destroy (and this prayer is being answered in the affirmative, daily, in Iraq and Afghanistan). But there was also the fact that Saddam was a growing threat, a terrorist sponsor and someone who had demonstrated his willingness to be quite horrific if he saw any personal advantage in so doing. For the President – outside of any larger strategic ideas – it came down to this in the post 9/11 world: do we work on the assumption that we can contain Saddam even to the point of preventing another 9/11, or do we get rid of him as the safer alternative?
The choice to go on the offensive is always fraught with risk, and it takes rare courage for a commander to order one – one thinks of the complete failures in wars past (McClellan in the Civil War being a prime example) who failed the test…who simply lacked the courage to step out into the unknown and attack the enemy. The bunker mentality in command is always appealing – you can feel safe and sure and your risks are limited or, at least, it seems so…but any commander who just waits for the enemy to strike is setting himself up for complete defeat, because the attack will come in a time and place least expected. President Bush seems to have immediately understood on 9/11 that unless we struck at the enemy, we were doomed to ultimate defeat – there was no grand conspiracy, just an understanding that the result of a defensive war is defeat, and that in war there really is no substitute for victory.
It seems certain that the internal debate was strong prior to the decision to liberate Iraq – and those who counseled caution, even to the point of de-facto cowardice, were able to martial strong arguments on their side; but to say that those who prevailed and ordered the liberation were wicked while those who opposed it were saintly is to over simplify a highly complex issue. While there is an absolute Truth ruling the universe, imperfect human beings can only, at best, come close to such truth – we can never be sure, on our own hook, that we’re 100% right, and to indict a decision in hindsight based upon information the decision makers didn’t have at the moment of decision is both unfair and worthless.
President Bush, in the end, ordered the liberation of Iraq with the strong support of the American people and the Congress of the United States – those who now try to say they were hoodwinked into agreement are the worst sort of blackguards; people who stuck their finger in the wind in 2002 and then, again, in 2004 and just went where the wind was blowing, and who now try to convince us that they are the honorable ones standing up for principle. In the event, the liberation was a complete success, and after a long period of difficult battle, the right strategy (and, note it, a highly aggressive strategy) is prevailing in the post-liberation phase of the Iraq campaign. President Bush has been proved right in the particular desire (to eliminate the Saddamite threat) and in the general sense (that liberating Iraq would be conducive towards building a free and anti-terror Arab/Moslem world). I imagine that, once Bush is out of office, the scoundrels who now condemn will once again see where the wind is blowing and will tell us they were with us all along – but, no matter; such people are beneath contempt and unworthy of notice. What matters is that we have a President who is able to make a decision – and who has been assisted by men and women who strongly argued their conflicting cases. Our hope is that on January 20th, 2009 we will still have such a President, and such an Administration.
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